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Life After the Videogame Crash 215

Posted by Zonk from the look-out-below dept.
Clark Hall writes "Is it 1983 all over again? E3 is over and millions of gamers are realizing they can't afford a PS3, or an HDTV. Is it time for a steep and painful correction in the gaming market? Pointlesswasteoftime has been tracking what is looking like a Hindenburg voyage for console gaming, with HDTV playing the role of Hydrogen." From the article: "There's going to be a lot of money lost the next few years, a lot of articles written, a lot of panic, a lot of changes. And when gaming comes back, it will hopefully be different and innovative and based on something other than eye candy and the shock value of blood and guts and hookers. Hopefully it will allow for creativity from the players, and room for small, independent game makers to create content. Hopefully it will be something every working person can afford. "
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Life After the Videogame Crash More

Life After the Videogame Crash

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  • PC Gaming (Score:3, Interesting)

    by daitengu ( 172781 ) * on Monday May 15, 2006 @03:54PM (#15337065) Homepage Journal
    This could mean a huge boost in PC Gaming. I'm not willing to dish out $400-$500 for a console system and another couple grand for an HDTV, but I'm certainly willing to spend the money to upgrade my PC.

    • Re:PC Gaming (Score:5, Insightful)

      by joshsisk ( 161347 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @04:19PM (#15337355)
      I think most people have the opposite opinion. I gave up on upgrading my PC to play the newest games, and I think many other people also prefer not to have to try and keep up.

      With a console, you know that when you buy, you can play all the games for it.

      And do you need an HDTV to play these new systems? I don't think any of them require it.
      • No, none of them require HDTV. I think what the author is trying to say is that this new generation's "hook" is HD gaming, and you'll need an HDTV in order for that hook to get you to buy the system.

        While I know he thinks that Nintendo is gonna fail with older gamers because older gamers don't have money to spend on their own games due to their kids... when they go to buy a console for their kids, I think the price will have an effect. Not a "Nintendo wins the console war" effect, but a "the Wii sells b
    • Also, the gaming market more diversified now than it was in 1983.... if PC gaming crashes, the MMORPG may well not crash... if consoles crash, handheld gaming may not crash... if all mainstream gaming crashes, web-based flash games and open-source concept games won't crash.

      And, if I read it right, the 1983 crash was coincident with the introduction of a new gaming platform (the home computer) which destabilized the market a bit, whereas the gaming markets are largely stable now (unless handheld or cell

      • Re:PC Gaming (Score:3, Insightful)

        by blincoln ( 592401 )
        And, if I read it right, the 1983 crash was coincident with the introduction of a new gaming platform (the home computer) which destabilized the market a bit

        I remember the crash in the 80s, and I would argue that this was not the case. In fact, I think the author of TFA is correct.

        Then, as now, there were new consoles coming on the market. They were too expensive, there were too many optional add-ons that not many games supported, there was a glut of mediocre games for the previous generation of consoles, a

    • Re:PC Gaming (Score:3, Insightful)

      by daveisfera ( 832409 )
      Cause shelling out $400-500 just for a video card obviously makes a lot more sense.
      • I'd rather shell out that much on a video card than pay for a console.
        I paid $300 for my last video card 4 years ago, and I can still play most games that are out there now. Oblivion runs a bit slow at times, but it's playable. I bought an X-Box 3 years ago, and now there's games for the 360 out that I can't play.

  • You can afford HDTV and video consoles (Score:5, Insightful)

    by WillAffleckUW ( 858324 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @03:56PM (#15337076) Homepage Journal
    Seriously, you can buy an HDTV for about $500 now if you look around, it will be $300 by Christmas 2007 or shortly thereafter, and you can even get a 1080p version right now for $500 (check out the NY Times electronic reviews a couple of weeks back, and in the Wall Street Journal two weekends ago in the Saturday issue).

    And you can buy a Nintendo Wii by about Presidents Day 2007 for a reasonable price at Costco - maybe even by Christmas 2006.

    The world isn't over. Your old TV works fine with a cable box, you don't need a 64 inch screen HDTV, you can settle for a 32 inch or 40 inch one.

    • Re:You can afford HDTV and video consoles (Score:4, Insightful)

      by duffbeer703 ( 177751 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @04:03PM (#15337151)
      Most people live paycheck to paycheck in the US... expecting parents to dole out $1,000+ so they can shell out $70 for their kid to play videogames is a little absurd.

      HDTV is a solution looking for a problem. TV was fine the way it is.
      • HDTV prices have been dropping, and in 10 years, they may well be affordable and commonplace, even in paycheck-to-paycheck households. Also, there are other reasons than gaming to buy an HDTV...

        I mean, there *is* a lot of HDTV content out there... even 1970's movies have enough resolution to be scanned in in HD... PC games have been in "HD" for a long time now... and digital cameras have LONG gone beyond the 0.3 megapixels that SD TVs provide. These may well not be reasons to switch *now*, but if H

        • Even 1930s movies (or earlier) have enough resolution to be scanned in HD, I would imagine (and if you could find a good enough print). Films today use the same 35mm film format that has been is use since the 1890s (though the chemistry HAS been improved to make a better image, and there have been innovations such as sound-on-film, color and so forth). Actually, 70mm used to be more prevalant, which has even more detail.
          • I presume lenses have gotten slightly better over time too? For instance, Metropolis [tripod.com] from 1927 seems somewhat blurry (or maybe it has some purple fringing or something?), and probably wouldn't have much extra useful resolution if scanned in to HD.
      • Most people live paycheck to paycheck in the US...

        Two things:

        a) This is not true, as any basic check of median income would have told you ("median" being the key word, because it's not as skewed by rich folks as "average" income would be).

        b) Even if it were true, the conditions for the industry now are still better than they were from 1977-1980, when video gaming first exploded in this country.

        The Atari VCS cost $249 when it was first launched. That's more than $800 in today's dollars. You were lucky to find a 19" TV set for $500 - about $1,500 in today's dollars. And that at a time when unemployment was more than 10%. Yet still, the industry flourished.

        There is no economic reason whatsoever why the average American couldn't afford a $400 console and a $500 TV today if they could afford the equivalent of an $800 console and a $1,500 TV in 1977. All this bitching about price is just a lot of whining, nothing more.

        I'm not saying everyone can afford it, but if you can't, then you've got bigger problems to solve anyway. There's no use crying about game consoles - work on getting some food on your table and a roof over your head first if you're poor enough that $1,000 for five years or more worth of entertainment is unaffordable. (Remember, TV's can entertain just fine even without a game console hooked up...)

        The only difference between now and 1977 is that there is more competition for our disposable income. But why is this something to bitch and moan about? So because you just bought a $300 cell phone or a $1,000 laptop PC or a stack of DVD movies, the electronics and video game industries have to lower their prices for you? To a large extent, they have - adjusted for inflation, everything game-related is cheaper than it used to be (including games). But there's only so far they can go.

        I'm not being elitist - I'm saying that most people do have the money, they just don't know how to prioritize their purchases. They act like it's the manufacturers' responsibility to just make everything so cheap that they can afford to buy everything they'd ever want. And those that really don't have the money really need to be concentrating on things other than game consoles anyway.

        I don't see any cost parallel between now and 1983. Cost wasn't the reason for the crash anyway - in 1983, there were systems at every price point from about $75 up to $275. And in fact, one of the main reasons for the crash was the exodus from game consoles to more expensive computers that played more advanced games. People would have rather paid $400 for a C64 or $800 for an Apple II than $100 for an Intellivision or $150 for a Coleco Vision. So I don't see that affordability really has anything to do with either era, or anything to do with any possible crash, past or present.
        • The only big problem is most people don't really care how sharp their tv is, and most people aren't keen on upgrading their entrie dvd collection, and while they can afford it, it doesn't follow that they will rush out and buy it.

        • Re:You can afford HDTV and video consoles (Score:4, Insightful)

          by ivan256 ( 17499 ) * on Monday May 15, 2006 @05:54PM (#15338290)
          I'm not being elitist - I'm saying that most people do have the money, they just don't know how to prioritize their purchases.

          They just don't prioritize them the same way you do.

          HDTV isn't a priority for most people with perfectly functional SD sets already in their living room. The problem is worse for gamers, because a signifigant percentage of consoles are likely connected to hand-me-down sets that used to be a family's main set.

          The industry needed to go HD at some point, but HD gaming will be irrelevant this generation other than as laying the groundwork for when a signifigant percentage of TVs are HD... perhaps 6 years from now?

        • Re:You can afford HDTV and video consoles (Score:4, Interesting)

          by porcupine8 ( 816071 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @06:34PM (#15338569) Journal
          work on getting some food on your table and a roof over your head first if you're poor enough that $1,000 for five years or more worth of entertainment is unaffordable.

          Uh, maybe spread out over those five years. However, if I were going to drop $1000 on anything at once (whether it's a computer or a HDTV and console), it's going to take some saving up. I have no problem keeping a roof over my head, but I also don't have $1000 sitting there with no strings attached ready to be spent. Which leads to...

          I'm saying that most people do have the money, they just don't know how to prioritize their purchases.

          Out of context, this is one of the truest things ever said on Slashdot. In context, it is one of the silliest.

          Maybe their priorities just don't include these items. I have no desire for an HDTV. I'd eventually like to replace my little 13" with something like a 30" (maybe even one with more than just coax input), but even that is low on my list of priorities. Sure, I *could* save up for an HDTV and PS3 in a few months, but right now that money is going into savings for travel, a house, pet care, a new laptop, among other things that are higher on my priority list than these.

          • I'm saying that most people do have the money, they just don't know how to prioritize their purchases.

            Out of context, this is one of the truest things ever said on Slashdot. In context, it is one of the silliest.

            Maybe their priorities just don't include these items. I have no desire for an HDTV. I'd eventually like to replace my little 13" with something like a 30" (maybe even one with more than just coax input), but even that is low on my list of priorities. Sure, I *could* save up for an HDTV and PS3 in

        • Re:You can afford HDTV and video consoles (Score:2, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward
          "The Atari VCS cost $249 when it was first launched. That's more than $800 in today's dollars."

          I hate these statements, look at things like wage increases and compare them to "adjusted" dollars, there is simply no way my parents were making 4x the amount of money in 1980 then they were today, their wages have remained relatively flat since that time, so I guess they are making 4x less money? Notice how the price of games has remained betwen 35-60us, 40-70CDN. And they've been that way since 1987!! Games s
        • I'm not saying everyone can afford it, but if you can't, then you've got bigger problems to solve anyway.

          Actually, if I can't afford it, it's the video game companies that have the problem, not me.
        • My thoughts exactly. A "correction" in hardware prices would imply that they're overpriced (or underpriced, I suppose), but expensive != overpriced, and prices are a function of what the market will bear. As long as millions of parents will fork out the cash for little Johnny, we can expect to see high prices for consoles. In fact, the success of the 360 indicates that, if anything, prices could probably stand to go a little higher.

          On the other hand, HD displays are expensive because of research into new
        • Bang on. When I look at the featurespec of the PS3 and my Mac Mini, compared - I don't see a lot of wiggle room for Sony. Particularly considering the PS3 will eat the Mini for lunch. Now - are we going to NEED all those features in the first year - or even see them used at all? Hard to say. My first-gen PS2 still has firewireports on it which never got used, and a hard drive port that keeps spiders happy. but the console got a lot more use in 6 years than the entertainment return on - say - a flight and ho
        • a) This is not true, as any basic check of median income would have told you ("median" being the key word, because it's not as skewed by rich folks as "average" income would be).

          Median (or any other measure of "average" income) has absolutely nothing to do with whether or not a family lives paycheque to paycheque. The grandparent post is actually bang on, especially in North America but also in the rest of the 1st world too. This is for several reasons:

          1) Wages in most 1st world countries have almost,
      • Most people live paycheck to paycheck in the US.
        In another discussion, someone pointed out that most Americans have lots of surplus income to waste on videogames. Which is it?
    • It seems that every reviewer with this angle says the same thing...you can't get a good HDTV for under $1000. That's all well and good, but as you've pointed out, untrue. Not only that but every reviewer seems to confuse HDTV and LCD/Plasma.

      I have a beautiful Sony Wega 32" HDTV (up to 1080i) with a TUBE. Yes, the antiquated and unloved tube...but let me tell ya, that thing has an amazing picture, will outlast (probably) any LCD or Plasma and even with the giant footprint (weight alone was 165lbs) it stil

    • Yes, you can get an HDTV for $300. But for $300 (or, say $340 [circuitcity.com]), I can get a giant 32 inch television. This isn't carefully hunting for a sale; this walking into Best Buy or Circuit City with $340 (plus tax) and walking out with a big television. We're (mostly) Americans here. Bigger is better. I like having a big television. For 32 inches of HD I'm paying $700 [circuitcity.com] or more. I've been promised cheap HDTVs for years now, but they keep failing to arrive. HD is nice, but given that most of my signals are SD

    • Just because I have a $1,000 in the bank doesn't mean I'm willing to spend $1,000 on a game system setup.

  • Crash? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Carlbunn ( 817714 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @03:59PM (#15337103)
    What videogame crash? I can certainly afford an under 300usd Wii. Oh wait, you mean sony? They'll just have a wonderful future building cameras, and slapping rootkits on the wrong places

  • And this is why... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by d3ac0n ( 715594 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @03:59PM (#15337107)
    I'm sticking with PC gaming.

    I just can't justify spending all that money on a game console, and then on top of that, having to shell out THOUSANDS for an HDTV set just so I can see Solid Snake in Hi-Def? Ummm.. NO.

    I'm sticking with my old-fashioned Tube T.V. as long as I possibly can, and I'm not buying any new HD or Blue-ray DVD players until the format war is good and over and prices come down to something reasonable. Which means I won't be getting an HD TV or DVD players for probably 5-10 years.

    I'm sure I won't miss it either.

  • Myopic (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ObligatoryUserName ( 126027 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @04:00PM (#15337110) Journal
    I read this article earlier today, and the author just writes off the Wii completly. What he's not grokking, is that the Japanese game market already crashed a few years back. Microsoft and Sony were able to use the ever growing US market to write that off as an anomoly, but Nintendo took it to heart and came out with the DS and now the Wii in response.

    So, yes, it's reasonable to say that Sony and Microsoft (and all their 3rd party developers) are in for a harsh awakening, but Nintendo is already on the other side of the crash and things are looking better than ever.
    • What he's not grokking, is that the Japanese game market already crashed a few years back.

      It didn't "crash". It had a downturn. That's not the same thing.

      Some people, especially those that are too young to remember it, don't realize what 1984 was really like. Consider the fact that there were no game consoles on the market. None. (At least not in the US.) That seems impossible now, until you remember that the Atari 2600 hit in 1977 and most people had never heard of video gaming before that. So it wa
      • You're right, "crash" is overstating it. I was under 10 in 1984, and I don't even remember the interruption between playing Atari games and getting a NES. I guess I vaguly remember that games got really cheap at some point and we picked up a bunch of cartridges we wouldn't have gotten otherwise, but heck - I actually liked the ET game. :)

        Anyway, the XBox 360 has already sold more than 3 million consoles, so it's not like the market will completly go away, though it might not be able to sustain today's prod
      • Then again, the whole Japanese downturn might just have been people saving money in anticipation of the new consoles.
  • "And when gaming comes back, it will hopefully be different and innovative and based on something other than eye candy and the shock value of blood and guts and hookers. Hopefully it will allow for creativity from the players, and room for small, independent game makers to create content. Hopefully it will be something every working person can afford. "
    So it's the Nintendo Wii.

  • Picture of one million dolars bogus. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by tempest69 ( 572798 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @04:04PM (#15337165) Journal
    Its a nitpick, but that big pile of cash is way over one million bucks. each bundle of 100 should be $10000, leaving 100 bundles as one million. a stack 4 deep, 5 across and 5 high (or any other combo that meets the size requirement).

    Otherwise it would be a monster to make any kind of cash on a good bank heist. You would need to hire day laborers just to get all the cash into your rental truck..

    Storm

  • Bah... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Richard Steiner ( 1585 ) <rsteiner@visi.com> on Monday May 15, 2006 @04:04PM (#15337169) Homepage Journal
    Just relax, pull out that old copy of UT or TA or NFS III or Madden 2001, and ignore all of the gnashing of teeth by the hardware vendors. If it's fun, it's good. Who says it also has to be high tech?
    • > If it's fun, it's good. Who says it also has to be high tech?

      Holy crap, finally someone out there who agrees with me. I still play my SNES all the time. If it's fun, play it!
    • In TFA this issue is discussed: most people are not entertained by games they have already played, or even games LIKE they have already played. Constant innovation is needed, and the innovation in the graphics area is at an end. That is one of the reasons why the author predicts the crash.

      Personally, I still like to drag out my C64 every few years, but I admit thatr is mainly nostalghia.

      • Are you kidding me?! I still love a good game of Crazy Taxi or Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2 (yes, TWO) on my Dreamcast.

        And the three games I play the most (still!) on my PC are GTA 3, Railroad Tycoon 2, and Age of Kings (AoE II)

  • Moronic article (Score:5, Insightful)

    by interiot ( 50685 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @04:05PM (#15337180) Homepage
    This article is so full of statements that are a big stretch that's it's difficult to even discuss the core issue...

    • all Wii games are going to do very poorly. Why is none of the other gaming press writing about this, why has only this guy has seen the light?
    • the Wii controller is a cheap gimmick... true innovation won't come until we have sensory suits or neural inputs. True, but gamers aren't going to stop playing games just because the stuff we see on TV can't be bought right this instant.
    • console hardware loses money. Yeah? And they make money back through royalties on each game sold.
    • point #3: movies are more immersive than games. Huh?? And even if this is true, why has it not been constantly true, why does it mean that the gaming industry was doing well a couple years ago, but will crash any day now?

    • Re:Moronic article (Score:3, Interesting)

      by ADRA ( 37398 )
      "all Wii games are going to do very poorly"

      He said the couple non-kiddie-type games looked weak. The article's author seemed indifferent about if the Wii would be successful or not. He did say MS/Sony would bleed though.

      "the Wii controller is a cheap gimmick..."

      Sadly, the Wii controller 'could' turn into a cheap gimmick. We've seen them before and we'll see them well into the future. We just have time to discover if the controller's gimmick or a useful innovation.

      "console hardware loses money. Yeah? And the
      • Nintendo turned a huge profit off the gamecube. THere was a brief time their profits dipped, but they were always in the black. I don't have numbers, but when you combine always selling the Cube for a profit with selling so many 1st party games, they made nearly as much as Sony.

  • Here we go again... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Jarlsberg ( 643324 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @04:08PM (#15337209) Journal
    Another blogger thinks the game market is heading for a crash. Please come up with some more original ideas. This topic comes up every few weeks, it seems, with nothing new added to the table ("PS3 going to be soo exepensive, teh market will crash for sure" -- uh, yeah. We still have inexpensive PCs, the moderately expensive Xbox360 and the probably cheap Wii).

    Looking at market trends, it's difficult to see just why there will be a big crash. Xbox360 keeps selling, massive turnout for E3, Nintendo is still selling shitloads of Nintendogs, and PS3 will definitely turn heads, no matter the price. Seriously, are these *really* signs pointing to a crash?

    • I agree mainly. If I'm going to discuss a crash it would be more along the lines of:

      Microsoft and Sony and engaged in a "winner take all" style war neither can win. They both have the resources to lose money non these systems but the questions remains, how much is too much? Who will flinch first? Who will come in to compete when one falls off forcing the "winner" to still throw money into the pit?

      Companies are in business to make money. Any money they have lost and are losing is a calculated risk, but

  • This is a software issue (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Cthefuture ( 665326 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @04:08PM (#15337214)
    Seriously, I would buy a $1000 game console if it had games worth playing. I might even pay more than that considering a console lifespan is 5+ years (ie. generally longer than the $2000+ computer I am using).

    Todays games are just barely even worth a $200 console let alone 3 times that price. As the summary mentions, the current crop of games are lacking that certain something that makes you want to play them because they traded it away for fancy graphics and sound.
  • I don't think video games will crash (unless you're running Windows). I think Sony and Microsoft will be hurting for a while since they're introducing very expensive consoles that don't offer a significant bang per buck at a time where people are more conscience of prices because of energy costs. I think more people will probably wait for the prices on the consoles and the video games to drop significantly before buying.

    My friends and I are not paying $500+ USD for either Sony or Micrsoft. The jury is st
  • It's the same article he posted on the industry crashing with some minor tweaks. Just another click-whore, move along.

  • maybe it wasn't the Hydrogen (Score:3, Insightful)

    by kisrael ( 134664 ) on Monday May 15, 2006 @04:16PM (#15337316) Homepage
    Maybe it wasn't the Hydrogen [wikipedia.org] but the coating on the fabric... personally I think that disaster has given Hydrogen an undeserved bad rep when it comes to nextgen fuel options.
    (hell, if someone described how dangerous the stuff we fill our cars with now can be to us for a new fuel, it would never get adopted.)
    • Nah, HDTV is the Hydrogen that will lift the consoles to ever greater heights!

      Hmm...
    • It's amazing how it can take seventy years before people figure out that false assumptions were made about big, news-shaping events like the Hindenburg disaster. --Even more amazing is that now, when the data is freely available, nobody cares enough to restructure their belief systems. It's like the mythology of an event becomes more important than reality. Or maybe people are just un-curious. I don't know.

      I wonder what other big, recent disasters might have been given a false spin with the general publ
  • There's going to be a lot of money lost the next few years, a lot of articles written, a lot of panic, a lot of changes. And when gaming comes back, it will hopefully be different and innovative and based on something other than eye candy and the shock value of blood and guts and hookers.

    That's all well and good, and I really couldn't care less if something like that happened (which I'm kind of skeptical of anyway). But if they create something "different and innovative", I sure hope they they don't take a
  • This guy gets half his facts wrong and the other half he completely makes up. He talks like the video game industry crash of the early 80s like it was some inexplicable cataclismic event that no one could explain. At that time, literally ANYONE could make a game for the Atari, and there was no governing body that certified a game was acceptable. A LOT of crap was released. Then along came Nintendo, requiring all games released for their system to be "Liscenced by Nintendo". And whats with the "...Sony plan
    • The article he sites doesn't make a statement even remotely close to that.

      Well, the article cited [redherring.com] does say "Estimates have been $900 per console, according to Merrill Lynch analysts..." Let's see, $499 retail, minus $900 production cost equals...a good bit more than $400 per machine lost when you consider that Sony only gets about half of the retail price.

      What article were you reading?

  • A reader at my forum [unanimocracy.com] posted a question regarding the PS3 and if it is really more expensive than the PS2. In 2000, the PS2 sold for US$299. In 2006, the PS3 will sell for $599. Over the past 6 years, the dollar has fallen in value by about 50% in many areas of the market (not just gasoline or housing). Things haven't really gotten more expensive, the dollar has just become more worthless. You can thank Greenspan and Bernanke for their inflationary monetary policy.

    For many households, their incomes have
    • Good point. I agree, the current commodity bull run has as much to do with rising demand as with the dollar depreciating. Whoever modded the parent troll needs to get out from under their own bridge.

      The PS3 is launching at EUR 500/600, just like in the US. However, the PS2 launched at EUR 450. What a difference a few years make!

      (FYI, advertized prices include VAT/sales tax in Europe, which usually runs in the 15-20% range. So the "EUR 1 = USD 1" rate retailers are using today is about right. Ask the British
  • Pointlesswasteoftime has been tracking what is looking like a Hindenburg voyage for console gaming

    Hey hey, now wait a minute here... HDTV is still a new technology, and the discs and standalone players are barely even out yet. How can they be so sure HDTV will *still* not fall in price like basically any other maturing technology in time? And what's this about PS3 too expensive? Console gaming != PS3. There's that smash hit Wii from Nintendo according to E3 reporters, and of course the Xbox 360.

    I call rubbi

  • Here's what I see (Score:2, Interesting)

    by mythandros ( 973986 )
    I see consoles getting more and more expensive and decent gaming PC's getting cheaper and cheaper. When the price of one gets close to the price of the other, how can there not be a confrontation?
  • I think the author of TFA got it just right.

    I'm almost 40 years old, now. My wife and I just had our first child last week. I barely have time to log into here to catch the news, much less any inclination for paying that much money for a console to play inferior games to what you get on the PC.

    The console market is in trouble, but they don't really want us to know it. They want to hope for a perfect storm of entertainment, and unfortunately for the, the holy grail is realistic and affordable VR gaming.
  • And you wanted a "content appliance" to go with it that let you download things off the 'net and even let you do some things like web browsing and email and such on it.

    Nintendo is making a game console (I think) but the PS3 and XBOX 360 are heading toward becoming "content appliances" like I've described. I don't think it's a stupid gamble on the part of MS and Sony. They care about the games, but they care more about people downloading movies and music and such (for a fee) from the MS and Sony networks.

  • I bought the original PS when I could get it, completely modded, for 150DM, I've skipped the second generation completely so far, but I'm tempted (especially since I'm moving to an all-free-software PC) to try the third. So, Wii, XBoX360 and PS3 are my options:

    Wii
    It has a crappy name, but looks halfway decent. The price seems to be ok (I'm not that much of a video gamer, as you might have concluded by now), but I'll probably not be happy with the game choices (I never had a thing for Nintendo titles, whi
  • ...but it had the exact same headline last time [slashdot.org].
  • For $600-$800 I can get a good PC and play games on it.

    One example... GTA 3 looks 1000x times better on my PC than any version did on the PS2 and a TV set. The same can be said for a great many games. Now I don't know about the new Xbox360 or PS3, but I don't want to have to buy an HDTV and a $600 console to approach what I already have on the computer and nice 21" CRT.

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